Bella Printing & Signs

Absolutely fabulous. I had a small but very important T-​shirt printing job I needed done in a very short timeframe. I called all of the big «established» printers in the greater Boston area, and nobody would accommodate the job. «We’re too busy,» they said. One printer kept insisting to me that the design I had would look «terrible» — «it’ll never work.» «Also,» he told me, «it’ll be so expensive [well over $ 600 for the $ 30/​piece per-​color, per-​side, per-​effect plate set-​up charges for the 29 shirts, two colors, front and back], «it’ll cost me over $ 300, and I won’t even have started printing the first shirt.» He told me bluntly that «It’s not worth it for me to do this job. Maybe if it was 100 shirts, or I had an extra week, it would be worth it for me.» In the end, I DID manage to find a shop that told me they could do it – they farm all their jobs out to their «mother ship» factory somewhere far away — but with all the per-​color etc. plate fees, plus a «rush charge» of $ 75, the job would cost over $ 700.
Then I discovered Bella Printing.
Starting to despair, I called up and spoke with Amber, the owner of the small, charming shop just down Main Street from Woburn Center. Amber was wonderful — relaxed, professional, and very straightforward. Not only was she willing and able to do the job, but the price was close to half what the «big printers» were charging. «I don’t believe in per-​plate set up fees,» Amber told me. «I think they’re just a made-​up fee that a lot of printers charge to get more money out of you.»
The only difference between Bella and anyone else, besides the starkly lower cost and the flexibility, was the fact that Bella’s shirt silkscreening process can’t accommodate «halftones» — the conversion of pictures into small dots. My design had areas that I expected to be dots, so I just used an easy Photoshop process to turn the «picture-​like» areas into lines of varying widths (Photoshop does this automatically) instead of dots. I got her the artwork, and she called promptly to tell me the lines appeared to be too close together. I modified the lines, resent her the artwork — and two days later received a box containing SUPERBLY printed shirts, with two colors on the front and THREE colors on the back. Amber made the design look great — in men’s, women’s and youth sizes. The shirt quality was fantastic — nice, thick, 100% cotton Gildan. The shirt color, which Amber helped me spec out, was consistent across all shirts — perfect.
I cannot recommend Bella Printing more. Amber is a small local entrepreneur who simply does it better, faster, and less expensively than anyone else — and she helped us out of a jam at the same time as she provided us with excellent quality printing. Rest assured, I will be calling Bella first — for as many of my clothing printing, indoor and outdoor signage, banner needs, decals, etc. as they can handle.
To summarize: I may have picked up my order, but OMG does Bella deliver! Bravo to a job beautifully well done, with aplomb to boot. Bella, quite simply, ROCKS.